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Chapter 3: A Steamy Encounter
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2025-03-26 02:19:49She should have left.
She should have turned around, walked back through the curtain, and pretended she never saw him standing there, like that, half-dressed, pale, very pale skin illuminated by the dim backstage lighting.
But she didn’t.
and before she could realize, she moved towards him.
Something in her chest was pulling, like a magnet drawn to something it shouldn’t be. Her pulse pounded in her ears, louder than the muffled music from the afterparty, louder than her own common sense.
Deverell didn’t move.
He just watched her, unreadable, his shirt hanging open, his breath slow and steady like he was waiting.
She stopped just inches from him, her head tilting as she studied his face, the sharp lines of his cheekbones, the impossible perfection of his features, the mouth that was slightly parted as if he had just exhaled a breath he hadn’t meant to take.
"So rude, so entitled...", she scrunched her eyes, her cheeks red from the drinks. Deverell tilted his head in amusement.
What was it about him?
Why did she feel like she knew him?
Why did she hate how much she wanted to touch him?
She was drunk, stupid, angry, and she knew this was reckless, but the ache in her chest—the one left by her ex’s betrayal, by the world’s cruelty—needed an escape.
And Deverell was right there. Tempting. Dangerous. Unmovable.
Her fingers reached for his collar, gripping the fabric of his half-unbuttoned shirt.
She expected him to step back. But he didn’t.
She was close enough that he could smell the whiskey on her breath, mixed with something else, something familiar, something dangerous.
She should not be this close. She should not be looking at him like that. Like she wanted to devour him. Like she had the right to.
And yet, he couldn’t move away.
His body, his senses, everything screamed at him to pull back, to stop this before it unraveled. And in this moment, he felt more tipsy than her.
And then she gripped his shirt tighter, her knuckles white, her breath shallow.
Before he could think, before he could rationalize what was happening—
Her lips crashed into his.
She moved without thinking, as if something took control of her.
The moment her mouth met his, heat shot through her like wildfire, consuming every last rational thought she had left.
His lips were warm, firm, motionless for only a second before he gave in. Then it felt like something snapped.
His hands were on her waist, pulling her closer, pressing her against him. She gasped against his mouth, her fingers sliding into his dark hair, fisting it as if she needed to keep him there.
His breath was ragged, his body impossibly tense beneath her hands. It wasn’t just a kiss. It was a collision. A war. It was something violent and unspeakably wrong, but neither of them stopped.
For Deverell, she tasted like whiskey and something sweeter, something familiar. He should have pulled away. Should have stopped this before it spiraled into something neither of them could undo.
But her mouth was hot and insistent, her body pressed into his, and his control, the control he had perfected over centuries, was slipping away.
Her hands were on his bare chest now, fingertips tracing the hard lines of his muscles, as if memorizing him.
A low sound rumbled in his throat as he pushed her back against the vanity, his palms flattening against the cool surface beside her hips.
Luna arched into him, her body soft in all the right places, fitting against him too easily, too perfectly.
His lips trailed from her mouth to her jawline, then lower, hovering over her throat. She gasped as his teeth grazed her skin.
And that was when something hit him. A pulse. A faint memory. A whisper of something ancient clawing its way back to the surface.
His hands tightened around her waist, his breath turning uneven.
He didn’t know her. He should have stopped. She wasn't for him, and somehow he could not.
She felt it too. The moment his mouth touched her throat, something shifted. It wasn’t just lust. It was something deeper, something buried in her bones, clawing its way out.
She sucked in a breath, her hands gripping his shoulders. “Deverell—” She didn't know why she said it.
He suddenly stilled. Like he had just remembered something. Like he had just woken up from a dream he hadn’t realized he was in.
His hands tensed, his entire body going rigid. A sharp inhale. A hesitation that hadn’t been there a moment ago.
Then, he pulled back. Abruptly. A bit violently.
Luna stumbled, blinking up at him in shock. His chest was rising and falling rapidly, his fists clenched at his sides. He was looking at her like he had just made a mistake.
Like she was a mistake. Something inside her twisted, pain, humiliation, anger.
And, just as quickly as it started, the moment was over.
Deverell stepped back, running a hand through his tousled hair, his lips still swollen from hers.
“Go.”
One word. Cold. Detached. Like nothing had just happened.
Luna’s heart lurched. Her hands trembled at her sides, her breath still heavy, still uneven.
This time she could not hide it from him. She was in confusion, rage.
"What the fu..." She fell to the ground, unconscious.
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